The American Meteorological Society (AMS) is the premier scientific and professional organization in the United States promoting and disseminating information about the atmospheric, oceanic, and hydrologic sciences. Its mission is to advance the atmospheric and related sciences, technologies, applications, and services for the benefit of society.
The polar-orbiting meteorological satellites operating in an observing system composed of early morning (EM), midmorning (AM), and afternoon (PM) orbits are extremely important to global numerical weather prediction (NWP). Following the proposal of World Meteorological (FY-3E), the world's first EM-orbit meteorological satellite for civil use, on 5 July 2021. With 11 scientific instruments on board, FY-3E is capable of providing atmospheric sounding, low-light imaging, sea surface wind detection, and space weather monitoring. Six months after launch, we have finished the postlaunch test for all the payloads. This paper presents the FY-3E data obtained during the 6-month test period, their performance, and key geophysical products driven ready for downstream applications. Experiments have been conducted to better disseminate the sounding data within the 6-h NWP assimilation window. Further efforts have been made to benefit data application for severe weather monitoring, diurnal cycle of Earth data, quasi-continuous sun monitoring for space weather, and climate research.
Life and civilization in arid regions depend on the availability of freshwater. Arid alpine river basins, where hydrological processes are highly sensitive to rapid warming, act as vital water towers for lowland oases. However, scientific understanding of precipitation variability and related cryosphere-hydrology processes is extremely limited because of the scarcity of in situ observations. The upper Danghe River basin (UDB; similar to 14,000 km2) is an arid and westerly dominated basin on the northeastern Tibetan Plateau and is the water source for the Dunhuang Oasis in China. We have established a comprehensive cryosphere-hydrometeorology observation network in the basin since 2014. At present, the network consists of 21 automatic rain gauges, 22 soil freeze-thaw monitoring stations, 4 automatic weather stations (AWS), and a 50-m gradient meteorological tower with an eddy covariance system. In particular, the 18 sites, located in remote areas without public networks, are equipped with new -generation BeiDou-3 communication terminals that enable the observations to be easily, safely, and reliably read and quality controlled in near-real time from offices in the city or at home. This integrated observation network over the UDB that facilitates the monitoring of cryosphere-hydrology processes, land-atmosphere interactions, and local weather processes. In addition, the observations are helpful for the objective evaluation, and continual improvement, of hydrological models, satellite -retrieval products, and reanalysis datasets. Finally, the network is expected to promote a better understanding of the status and role of water towers in arid zones and to provide basic data support for the sustainable development of the Dunhuang Oasis and the Belt and Road.
